Taylor Swift Kicks Off Long-Anticipated Eras Tour

By Mia Timlin

Thanks to the internet, it’s no secret that Nov. 15, 2022, was a hard day to be a Swiftie. At 10 a.m., 14 million Taylor Swift fans (and a good number of bots) logged into the Ticketmaster website in hopes of securing tickets to the Eras tour, effectively crashing the entire site. Those lucky enough to get a presale code for the day sat in front of their computers for as long as 12 hours, with many of their efforts ending in a hectic few minutes of trying to add seats to their online cart and coming out of the sale empty-handed. 

“I was someone with a really good place in line when I first queued,” says Olivia Stevermer ‘26 (Political Science, Economics and Public Policy). “I thought I would be in and out in a few hours, but then the whole thing freezes. I was just like, ‘Well dang it, I’m definitely going to be late to class now.’” Stevermer describes an unending experience of waiting in line, getting kicked out of line and trying to select disappearing tickets that lasted eight hours, until she was finally able to get her hands on three tickets at the end of the day.

For Ticketmaster, the entire experience ended in more than just unhappy Taylor Swift fans. In California, 26 fans are suing the parent company Live Nation for fraud and anti-trust violations. Not too long ago, the Minnesota House introduced HF1989 (which is indeed a reference to Taylor Swift’s fifth studio album), which aims to regulate ticket sales, especially when it comes to company fees in the resale market. Rep. Kelly Moller has voiced hope that this could be a party-bridging issue for Minnesota, and the entire situation has been an excellent demonstration of individual agency when it comes to taking political action — namely that if you see a change you want made, there’s are things you can do to help get it done!

The exorbitant price of tickets, especially after the platform added in their various processing fees once the tickets had been selected, was another thing the Live Nation/Ticketmaster family has been called out on over the past several months. The platform uses a “dynamic pricing” system that leaves the prices of tickets fluctuating from venue to venue, and some Swifties paid way more for their tickets than others. 

Teji Hunt ‘25 (Sonography) experienced several hurdles on the way to getting her tickets, and price was just one of them. “The day [the] presale started was really upsetting, for many reasons,” Hunt says. “I had anticipated the long wait to actually get in the queue and through the line to see what tickets were available, but I didn’t expect to get kicked out of the queue or have the queue freeze so many times. When I actually got in, I was a lot more excited because it was actually happening — I was going to get tickets. I knew they weren’t going to be cheap by any means, but I was definitely shocked by how expensive they ended up being, especially with the fees.”

The tour officially kicked off on March 18 in Glendale, Ariz., which officially changed its name to “Swift City” for a couple days in honor of the two-day Eras stop. Between the pre-sale and the first date, there have been a couple more opportunities for fans to get tickets for Swift’s three-hour 44-song set. In the wake of this tour comes “fan projects,” a Taylor Swift tour tradition that has happened on most of her major tours in the past. The surprisingly well-organized projects are mostly coordinated through social media and manage to get large amounts of fans participating in various ways. The most anticipated this time around being a friendship bracelet exchange, in reference to a “You’re On Your Own, Kid” lyric off the Midnights album.

It’s projects like this that leave many Taylor Swift fans with the feeling that they have a connection with the people at the show around them. “I’m actually most excited for the friendship bracelet trading,” Stevermer says. “I really love the group aspect of it.” Many fans find that it’s not just Taylor bringing them back to shows tour after tour, but the sense of community that can be found there. It’s not surprising that Eras tickets were such a hot commodity after several years of a global pandemic put a severe limit on gatherings like these.

While many fans feel that Eras is a type of returning home, for many this experience will be a first. “It’s going to be my first Taylor concert, so I’m just excited to finally experience her show,” says Skylar Mattson ‘25 (Exercise Science for Pre-OT). “I’ve been wanting to go to one since around age 7, so I’m really just happy to finally be going.”